Militants seize diplomat

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Negotiations were under way yesterday to try to secure the release of a senior Egyptian diplomat seized by militants as he left a Baghdad mosque - the first envoy to be taken hostage in a growing wave of abductions.

"We are involved in intense talks to try to secure his release," a source at the Egyptian embassy in Baghdad said. Mohamed Mamdouh Qutb, number three in the mission, was abducted after prayers on Friday afternoon. "We were so shocked. He's a very decent and religious man," said the source, who asked not to be identified.

The kidnapping of a well-protected diplomat marks a new departure for the militants.

Qutb, in his 50s, was shown sitting in front of six masked and armed men from a group calling itself the "Lions of God Battalions in Iraq" in a tape broadcast on Arab satellite channel al-Jazeera on Friday evening.

"The group said the abduction was in response to comments by Egyptian Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif that Cairo was ready to offer its security experience to the temporary Iraqi government," the Arabic television station said.

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Iraq's interim Prime Minister, Iyad Allawi, visited Cairo last week and discussed the possibility of using Egyptian troops in training Iraq's forces. But no deal was struck.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit, speaking in Cairo, said: "Egypt sending any forces or military personnel to Iraq was not a matter that has been proposed at all", the country's official news agency MENA reported.

Qutb's abduction came four days after he was widely photographed celebrating the release of an Egyptian truck driver kidnapped by insurgents earlier this month. He was freed after his Saudi Arabian employer promised to pull out of Iraq.

Militants have seized dozens of foreign workers since April to push demands for foreign troops or foreign companies to leave the country. Several hostages have been killed.

In the early months of the US-led occupation, the kidnappings appeared mostly to be criminally motivated, with many doctors and businessmen seized and ransom payments demanded.

In Baghdad yesterday the director of a state-owned Iraqi construction company was kidnapped on his way to work.

Raad Adnan, head of Al-Mansour Contracting, was kidnapped in central Baghdad. No one was injured and the kidnappers' demands were not immediately clear, a Government spokesman said.

In another hostage standoff, a group that has threatened to behead seven foreign captives issued a new 48-hour deadline to the Kuwaiti company that employs them and demanded Iraqi prisoners be freed from Kuwaiti and US jails.

- In Britain, an ICM opinion poll suggests that 59 per cent of voters think Prime Minister Tony Blair was dishonest over Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, despite an official report concluding that he had not purposefully misled the country.